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Keep in mind the movie and music industries are two of the greediest enterprises in America. For decades they have figured more ways of repeatedly profiting from the same product than any other business.

Let's see, wait for the next D* viewing opportunity and hope it works, or stop at one of the 5 Red Box locations that are all less than 2 miles from my house and pick up the BluRay.

I tried 3 times to watch Moneyball on D* PPV. Their system had no problem at all with the charges, it just wouldn't show me anything but the D* logo screen. The BluRay I got from Red Box worked perfectly the very second that I closed the tray on my player.

Yeah, to me, Red Box is easier because it actually works.

I just rented a BD from Red Box and it was scratched and wouldn't playback the last 45 minutes of the film. When I went to return it today the kiosk was down and I had to go find another location. Nothing's perfect in a imperfect world and that goes for RB as well.

A lot of people are familiar with Netflix and Netflix pricing, so it may be reasonable to start with their DVD rental plan of one-out-at-a-time, for $7.99 a month. Assuming that it takes 4 days round trip per DVD (1-2 days to get to you, you watch it that same night and return it the next day, 1-2 days to return to Netflix), in a month one can average approximately 7 moves. This brings the price of a single-movie rental to ~$1.15 from Netflix.

In that light, $5.99 seems just a tad high for a single movie rental, doesn't it?

First we had ABC thinking that not allowing people to fast forward through commercials on a DVR-type product was a good idea, and now comes the news that DirecTV will automatically delete Pay-Per-View shows you record with your DVR after 24-hours. This is apparently at the request of the major Hollywood studios who have decided that the best way to build up an audience is to piss them off by not allowing them to record the movies that they legally paid for via PPV, and then chose to record and time shift. Time shifting is perfectly legal, so there's absolutely no legal reason for DirecTV to ban the practice. As for the Hollywood studios, this is more backwards thinking. One of these days, someone in Hollywood is going to realize that pissing off your loyal customers isn't a good idea.

Yes, 30 days. Warner Brothers is one and I think Fox and Universal are as well.

What I see before long is a 30 day moratorium on rentals for all studios. Force consumers who want the movie to buy it, then release it to the rental outfits. Of course, NF, BB and RB could just purchase the movies at retail, but that would severely cut into profits.

A lot of people are familiar with Netflix and Netflix pricing, so it may be reasonable to start with their DVD rental plan of one-out-at-a-time, for $7.99 a month. Assuming that it takes 4 days round trip per DVD (1-2 days to get to you, you watch it that same night and return it the next day, 1-2 days to return to Netflix), in a month one can average approximately 7 moves. This brings the price of a single-movie rental to ~$1.15 from Netflix.

In that light, $5.99 seems just a tad high for a single movie rental, doesn't it?

Don't know how many DVDs or BDs I go thru in a month, but I've got a plan that gives me five discs at a time and usually go thru them in less than a week. I wish I could figure out what that costs per disc, but it's a whole lot less than PPV per disc. I don't watch many movies, been watching BBCA content lately (much better on discs than streaming or D*). I usually watch two hours of NF content a day. At least.

Hmm. Conservatively, that would be 30 discs a month. For ~$42 a month. A buck and change apiece, no? I could watch 30 BD movies a month if I could find some I have interest in. That would cost $180 for PPV for the month. I think I'll stick with NF.

Most of us don't like stealing, and even though it may cost more than we would like it to, we will pay for it first.

I don't LIKE "stealing", I have a basic subscription to DTV + HD + DVR. I think its already overpriced. I am not going to pay $5 to $6 for a movie that will get deleted after 2 days. I used to buy PPVs when they were $39.99 / $3.99. Not gonna happen when they are $60+ / $5.99 (and deleted after 1 day).

Look at the price in the market. RedBox can let me have a movie (Blu-Ray) for $1.50 per day. The studios get a percentage of this so we know their cut is less than $1.50 per day (or 24-hour period), but will use $1.5 for the purposes of this.

Now DirecTV wants $5.99 per 24-hour period. Take out the studio's cut of $1.50 (again we know it is less than $1.50) and DirecTV is getting $4.49 from this.

Now assuming RedBox did not have to pay the studios a cut, they are able to place boxes all over place and rent blu-rays for $1.50. So if they can do it for $1.50, the DirecTV should be able to beam them down from their satellites for $1.50.

So take the studio's cut at $1.50 and add the cost of the providing the service of $1.50 which equals $3.00. Call it $2.99. That should be the cost of a PPV for 24-hours.

In the DVD model the distributor buys the DVD for a one time price and then monetizes it over and over and over again each time the DVD is rented out. The studio gets their cut one time, not repeatedly.

In the streaming model, including PPV, it is transactional usually. The studio is getting a cut (a healthy one) every time the movie is rented. Every PPV, every purchase on iTunes or Xbox. Every time. That is why Red Box can charge what they are charging because their cost structure is much different for the titles.

In the DVD model the distributor buys the DVD for a one time price and then monetizes it over and over and over again each time the DVD is rented out. The studio gets their cut one time, not repeatedly.

In the streaming model, including PPV, it is transactional usually. The studio is getting a cut (a healthy one) every time the movie is rented. Every PPV, every purchase on iTunes or Xbox. Every time. That is why Red Box can charge what they are charging because their cost structure is much different for the titles.

While Redbox may use this model, Blockbuster pioneered a revenue sharing agreement in the late 90's. They got to buy movies for a low price, but then gave the studios a percentage (35-40) of the total rental revenue from those movies. Could be why Blockbuster never had the 30 day wait period.